April's here...not too many showers, but those flowers are already coming up!
Well, in the last month, went to two conferences: MACUL and National Science Teachers Association (NSTA). I LOVE learning from other teachers!
Some good memories:
MACUL:
- winning a Wii remote holder to make my own smartboard
- eating a large number of donuts in the car (correction: watching others eat lots of donuts)
- learning how one school was transformed by project based learning.
- spending some time with MACers!
NSTA:
- learning TONS about misconceptions in learning, and sparking an initiative in learning more about HOW to best address them after you figure out what the heck they are
- petting a penguin
- learning how one teacher scaffolds in scientific behaviors in her class to prepare them for rather amazing project based learning experiences
- staying with a friend from RI at a hotel in Chinatown in downtown Philly
What were some of your favorite conference memories? Have you gotten to try anything in the classroom?
So many of you have talked about the car trip (even though it was Looong) as a great opportunity to connect informally around important things. Where are the analogues to this for our classroom teaching? I KNOW that they are there, and (somehow) making a place for what Ivan Illich called "incidental learning" seems really important. Something to keep thinking about...
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